In a previous post I wrote all about KidZania in Kobe, Japan, but didn't mention anything about Anthony's experiences there because I thought I'd save them for a second post. However, being the photo-happy papa I am, this post ended up getting filled after just his first job!

As I mentioned in that previous post, Anthony had one job he really wanted to do, so we went directly there and got in line. Each session lasts about 15 minutes; and he'd have to wait during the first session, and would finally get to "work" during the second.

While waiting, he [...]

We took Anthony to KidZania yesterday, in Nishinomiya (near Kobe, about an hour and a half drive south from Kyoto). It's best described as "Vocational School meets Disneyland"... it's a place where kids get to pretend to be all kinds of things. The picture above is from the dental clinic, of course.

KidZania is a two-story indoor area filled with more than 70 different "businesses" where the kids can participate as an employee or customer. They can move from business to business, with each event taking from 15 to 30 minutes, although, like Disneyland, much time is spent waiting your [...]

It seems that Anthony had his first "test" in school, in Japanese class, and he came through with flying colors. I don't think I would have realized that the (2) in the lower-right was a monkey, so I would have missed some points.

On Saturday Anthony got to play in a park with two friends he hadn't seen in a while, kindergarten classmate Monet, and Gen (my friend Zak's boy). The park near Gen's house in Otsu (just over the mountains from Kyoto), ojigaoka park, is wonderful, both for kids to play and for parents to photograph.

The boys gravitated toward destructive play that involved "building" a "road" near where some minor construction was going on. This "road building" mostly involved throwing rocks....

Here's a view from the other side, showing the little construction zone they were violating...

I was curious what it [...]

Since starting first grade, Anthony has been collecting an allowance. He gets 50 yen a day (about US$3.60/week), which is substantially more than the five-cents-a-week that I got 40 years ago, but still much less than many of my own peers got at the time. In any case, 50 yen a day seems to be the right amount to help instill a sense of value and a respect for saving.

He's still not really grasping the concept of money – value to him is in the physical number of coins, not in their amount – but it's coming along. He'd [...]